Friday, May 26, 2017

If you just finished university with a degree in Computer Sciences, you are probably looking for a job… and if you are reading this article, you are probably still searching. Although you might not even know what a Mainframe is, you might want to consider a career on the “big iron”; and here is why.

The mainframe is a 40+ year old platform and most software is written in low-level languages such as Assembler or Cobol. Granted. As much as it appears non-attractive, it is a real opportunity: while most of the world data and processing resides in Mainframes, Mainframe professionals (so called “Mainframers”) are close to retirement. The equation is simple, IT talents with such knowledge will be a rarity in the very near future, and the biggest fortune companies will crave for them.

But … do not think Mainframe is solely legacy. In fact, lots of new projects exist on Mainframe, most of which use Java, C, or C++. The new trend of “virtualization” is a notion which has existed for decades in the Mainframe world. If you think about it, Mainframe systems are nothing other than a private cloud: Mainframe means an enormous amount of data, incredible processing capabilities, and very high security (who ever heard about a virus on a Mainframe?). Mainframe also rhymes with green computing, since it uses much less energy than other platforms, because one Mainframe can support a workload equivalent to thousands of distributed servers.